Arbutus

Last Friday I had a chance to take a walk around Pipers Lagoon Park in Nanaimo, British Columbia. This small park includes a mixed Garry Oak (Quercus garryana) and Arbutus (Arbutus menziesii) meadow with associated plants. It looks like it could be a fascinating place to spend some time botanizing a little later in the spring. The twisted branches of …

Jocie and I had a rare day without the kids and took full advantage of being able to explore an area that we haven’t visited before. After dropping the kids off at day care we packed a couple of water bottles, some lunch and headed south towards Nanoose Bay. The weather was definitely iffy and we thought that perhaps we …

Groves of twisted Arbutus (Arbutus menziesii) can be found at Helliwell Provincial Park on Hornby Island, British Columbia. A painting called “The Sunbathers” (by Daphne Stevens) hanging on my kitchen wall depicts a group of smooth, orange-barked arbutus trees basking in the sun on a hot, rocky hillside from BC’s southern Gulf Islands. There is something mesmerizing about this tree, …